


spell-stopp'd

by BlackEyedGirl



Category: Slings & Arrows
Genre: Community: fic_promptly, Ficlet, Gen, Post-Series, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-20
Updated: 2014-02-20
Packaged: 2018-01-16 13:33:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1349203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackEyedGirl/pseuds/BlackEyedGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Geoffrey and stage fright - before, alongside, and after Oliver.</p>
            </blockquote>





	spell-stopp'd

**Author's Note:**

> Written for fic_promptly, for the prompt of stage fright.

He can almost hear Darren – ‘Stage fright, Geoffrey, really? How dull. And on _Benvolio_?’ He doesn’t know what it is, has never before in his life felt such a terrifying _blankness_. The words are gone; it’s Act One, Scene One, and the fight has already been going on too long; he hasn’t stopped it. 

There is a tight grip on the back of Geoffrey’s neck. For a moment he thinks Oliver is here to murder him, start the tragedy early. Oliver murmurs, “Big breath. Feel your back. I'm right here.”

“Is that supposed to fucking _help_?” Geoffrey snaps. His eyes widen. He is not supposed to be cursing out his director, his already famous director, who casually picked Geoffrey out from the Young Company for Benvolio, presumably not expecting Geoffrey to ruin his fucking play. Geoffrey can’t breathe. Oliver shakes him, gentle enough that all Geoffrey does is move with it. Oliver’s hand cups the back of his head. Geoffrey turns around to face him. “I don’t know the-”

Oliver exhales, nearly a laugh. “Part, fools,” he says, and pushes Geoffrey onto the stage.

Geoffrey stumbles into the middle of the fight, parting them more effectively than he has ever managed before. He nearly stabs James, playing Tybalt, in their own sword fight, but reins it back before he really does create a tragedy. And there’s Darren again, ‘Oh for New Burbage, I see, you’ll manage not to _impale your colleagues_.’

“Shut up,” he whispers.

Oliver, appearing in the door of the dressing room, visible in the reflection in the mirror, raises one elegant eyebrow. “Am I interrupting?”

“Sorry, sorry, no.”

“I have a note.”

He isn’t supposed to be giving notes now but Geoffrey would no more stop him than whistle. “Yes?” he asks, expecting the worst.

“Smile a little more.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Romeo’s your friend, and he’s an idiot. Smile. It’s not a tragedy unless they’re happy first.”

He turns and leaves, getting the last word in a way that Geoffrey only later realises is habit.

He doesn’t mention the stage fright until they’re in the bar after the curtain. Oliver drifts past him, looking for something or someone else. Geoffrey snatches his arm. “I’m sorry for- before.”

“Don’t do it again.”

“I know, I won’t, I don’t know what-”

“You felt the play on your shoulders. The _theatre_ on your shoulders, the audience waiting. It happens. But don’t do it again. I want you for Orlando next season and I don’t have time to be coddling you onto the stage every night.”

Except it still happens, intermittently, as long as Geoffrey is an actor. He can’t predict it. It doesn’t happen for Romeo but takes him out at the knees when he plays Ferdinand. It does not – and he will swear to this – happen on the opening night of Hamlet. When he loses the words of the Prince of Denmark, Geoffrey is onstage, and even if he was not, he suspects no whispered ritual of Oliver’s could have saved him that night. 

But every time before that, when it did, Oliver would go through the same patient, slightly exasperated scene: _Big breath. Feel your back. I'm right here_. Oliver had no time to indulge other people’s neuroses and was never slow to poke a wound but in this one way he was always exactly the director Geoffrey needed. He did not doubt that Geoffrey had the words locked away somewhere, and he did not doubt the reality of the terror that temporarily drove them away. He simply helped Geoffrey get from one state to the other, the way he helped Geoffrey find passion, or betrayal, or rage, any other state he needed.

Hamlet happened, and then happened again, and then Lear. Geoffrey will not go on stage again because he is never quite sure what will happen when he does, and he has other offices now that rest the theatre on his shoulders just as readily.

But he still finds himself, even now, taking a breath and feeling his back. Oliver doesn’t say the words, but he is still right here, because he was there before, and that is all Geoffrey needs. “Good morning, welcome, I’m Geoffrey Tennant, I am your director, and we are here to discover whether Brutus was indeed an honourable man. This is Julius Caesar, and we have six weeks to work it out. Let’s start by going around the table.”


End file.
